More than 27,000 run in this race, hundred of thousands of spectators. If 2 perished that is too many, but I think our luck could have been much worse.

Kevsterino

Death toll now 3. RIP

Pete Baker

“I think our luck could have been much worse”

Indeed, Kevsterino.

Comrade Stalin

Horrifying scenes. Agreed Kevsterino, this could have been much worse.

Kevsterino

The third fatality is not confirmed and I may have been mistaken. I hope I was.

Pete Baker

The latest reports, as the FBI take over co-ordination of what it described as a “potential terrorist inquiry”, are that the bombs left three people dead, more than 140 injured, with 17 critically wounded.

Greenflag

April as the cruelest month ?

Another atrocity now in Boston to join the list 🙁

The fact that so few died may be indicative of a Ted Kaczynski type nutter than Al Quaeda .

@Greenflag, April does seem to bring out the worst in the lunatic fringe. Personally, I suspect a ‘lone wolf’ (apologies to a noble animal for being lumped in with scumbags) is at work here. This reminds me of when the Atlanta Olympics got bombed. Politically, Boston’s hue is of the deepest blue. Gay people get married there!?!? No shortage of crazies with a grudge against Beantown.

Greenflag

@kevsterino ,

Could be a neo con fringe nazi or some wired to the moon crazy a la Tim McVeigh .With 330 million people out there all you need is one or a couple of crazies to get their hands on ammo or explosives etc .

Beantown’s response has been measured -calm and focused . Obama’s speech was reassuring I thought and struck the right note -I guess there will be NRA types demanding that marathon runners should be allowed to carry weapons henceforth 🙁

Zig70

In some ways I’m not as shocked that some lunatic(s) attacked the Boston marathon as I was of Breivik’s actions in Norway. The cowboy romanticism of violence does invite a raised level of aggression and Drones, Guantanamo or high street arm selling has consequences which sadly are often not visited on just the hawks that advocate them.

FDM

It was a lone nutjob. The technical side of what has occurred would lead me to believe that. If you pick it apart you will probably come to the same conclusions.

Kevsterino

I’m not sure how to interpret the ‘cowboy romanticism of violence’, but I would offer my opinion that violence to some of my countrymen is no romantic notion. They are genuinely violent people. Make no mistake in thinking these are wannabe killers. They are the real McCoy.

Invitations to raised levels of aggression are certainly there. Guantanamo is still open. Obama promised to close it and has not closed it after all these years. Not sure about high street arms sales as most of the really dangerous stuff seems to be sold at ‘gun shows’.

The hawks sometimes get bit by their own vipers, but not nearly often enough for it to make any difference.

At any rate, the perpetrator(s) will be caught. I’d like to see the father of that 8 year old who was pulverized get a few minutes of quality time with the scum, if he so desires.

“Personally, I suspect a ‘lone wolf’ (apologies to a noble animal for being lumped in with scumbags) is at work here. This reminds me of when the Atlanta Olympics got bombed. Politically, Boston’s hue is of the deepest blue. Gay people get married there!?!? No shortage of crazies with a grudge against Beantown.”

“Could be a neo con fringe nazi or some wired to the moon crazy a la Tim McVeigh .”

“In some ways I’m not as shocked that some lunatic(s) attacked the Boston marathon as I was of Breivik’s actions in Norway. The cowboy romanticism of violence does invite a raised level of aggression”

“It was a lone nutjob. The technical side of what has occurred would lead me to believe that.”

“violence to some of my countrymen is no romantic notion. They are genuinely violent people. Make no mistake in thinking these are wannabe killers. They are the real McCoy.”

So then just like the LA Airport shooting, the DC snipers, the Times Square bombing and the murders in France last year we have examined the facts and come to the obvious conclusion.

Right-wing white nutjobs. Fair enough.

I mean who else could do such a thing other than right-wing white nutjobs?

Crickets chirp.

FDM

@Harry Flashman

I will stand by the lone nutjob. I made no reference as to his/her politics.

The size of the devices and the nature of their construction was what convinced me that this was not an organisation. They were crude small devices. A large organisation will usually have access to someone who is able to learn the methods of constructing more sophisticated devices.

Large bombs require a level higher again of expertise if they are to be home made. Otherwise the detonation will be isolated and you will simply destroy the explosive material rather than effectively detonating it.

Hence the level of technical expertise on show indicates… a lone nutjob.

PeterBrown

Although the use of pressure cookers is an Afghan insurgent method it is certainly not a particulalry sophisticated operation and I would suspect the FBI is already lloking for the buyers of the pressure cookers and rucksacks in which the bombs were placed.

I have also read loyalist comments about karma (in general terms) and whilst there is a time and a place for this sort of thing now is neither the time nor the place (much like Francie Molloy’s comments about the Mull of Kintyre crash being poetic justice).

The most effective comment is this vein I ever saw was Angus Deayton on HIGNFY and it had no context like these comments which frankly are right up (down) there with th anti Thatcher parties which those making them have condemned…

Kevsterino

Oh Harry, I think your automatic dismissal of right wing crazies is a mistake. If you can think of a reason why a left wing crazy would target Boston, MA for mayhem, I’m all ears. It is the most liberal area of the country (as well as most highly educated, but we’ll leave that out of the argument for the time being)

Then again, it might be the case that the sole perpetrator (I can’t in good conscience continue to defame wolves) has no political views at all and just wanted to kill some people.

In any case, I’d hate to be a man who needs to buy a pressure cooker in New England today.

carl marks

My sympathy to the families of the murdered, to the injured and to those who were traumatised by this obscene action
Latest (unconfirmed) reports are that 2 devices did not go off , if true Boston was lucky indeed.

Kev, unlike you I have dismissed no possible perpetrator, it could very well be a right wing crazy. What I commented on was the unanimous decision by all posters here that it could only be a right wing crazy.

I pointed out a few previous terrorist incidents where the “crazy right-wing white guy” was the immediate suspect when in fact the perpetrators turned out to be of an entirely different demographic.

Is there no one other than crazy right wing nutjobs that you can think of who might, just possibly, maybe, perhaps be possible of carrying out such attacks Kev? Anyone? No?

Kevsterino

Harry, I excluded no one. I merely pointed out that if it is politically motivated, Boston is a citadel of the American left. To my mind, that would limit the possibility of attack from the left to a low order of probability.

I hope it is a foreigner, actually. To my mind, the nightmare scenario is that it is some right wingnut. Bad news in a country so divided.

Greenflag

@ Harry Flash ,

‘What I commented on was the unanimous decision by all posters here that it could only be a right wing crazy;’

The probability is that it is most likely a right wing nut job , It could also be a white racist or Al Quaeda etc or even a lobbyist for the NRA trying to scare people into buying more guns to protect themselves 🙁

The USA Senate as well as it’s Congress is the personal fiefdom of the NRA- GIven the failure of the attempt to introduce broader background checks on arms buyers -the people of Newtown Connecticut and all those other towns in the USA who have suffered mass killings by armed crazies must realise that their children’s are worth less to US politicians than NRA contributions for their electoral expenses .

A Senate of Turds and a Congress of Baboons 🙁

What I commented on was the unanimous decision by all posters here that it could only be a right wing crazy.

Harry Flashman

“Bad news in a country so divided.”

Yes which is why it grates with me so much that as soon as any terrible incident occurs the US media and the usual suspects of the bien pensant liberal left automatically assume it’s the actions of a “right wing nutjob”. When nine times out of ten it’s either jihadists or mentally disturbed people.

The demonisation of anyone with a point of view to the right of Barack Obama is verging on the hysterical at this point (seriously Greenflag, you believe the NRA is some sort of terrorist oufit now?). The shooting at the Batman preview, the Sandy Hook shooting, the shooting of the senator, even Colombine years ago, were automatically assumed to be politically motivated by dangerous “right-wing” activists.

It has happened again here, the fact that Boston is a citadel of the liberal leftish social agenda is automatically put forward as cause for US conservatives to attack it. You know there is another political demographic, utterly opposed to the US conservative right who also don’t fancy gay marriage much, and who are mostly responsible for terrorist attacks in America, how come nobody in the posts above figured it might be them?

Just for the record an arrest has been made in the ricin-infected letter case. The arrestee is a left wing Democratic activist.

Funny how the media never refers to extreme-left wing nutjobs when these incidents occur.

FDM

Given Harrys input I am now convinced that in all probability it was a RIGHT WING NUTJOB.

Greenflag

‘you believe the NRA is some sort of terrorist oufit now?’

No Harry I don’t -They just aid and abet these crazies be they -right wing/left wing /fanatical christians/muslims etc in that the NRA’s ability to overturn the desire of the vast majority of Americans for background checks for all gun sales transactions through it’s political lobbying power in the Senate and House -makes a mockery of democracy and shows up the utter powerlessness of elected politicians of both parties in the face of corporate and special interests .

American democracy is dead -buried by the neo con nazis of corporate finance and the banksters of Wall St .

When one reflects that the USA produces and sells some 52% of all weapons manufactured on the planet and moreover that the USA’s armed forces (army , navy and airforce 0 are bigger and better equipped than all of the next 50 biggest armed forces on the planet combined then one has to aver that Eisenhower was not joking when he remarked that the unrestrained growth of the USA ‘s military and industrial complex was one of the greatest threats to America.

Greenflag

And for those who say well thats America -nothing to with us .

The fact is that whether we like it or not the USA kept ‘democracy ‘ alive during the dark days of totalitarian rule in Europe and throughout the Cold War and if the USA cannot pare back the neo con attack on it’s democracy then what hope for the rest of the world in particular the emerging developing world ?

Kevsterino

Oh Harry, ‘a left wing democratic activist’. Where did you find that? I read he’s an Elvis impersonator from Mississippi who decries the removal of God from the classroom.

I don’t know how familiar you are with politics in Mississippi, but it is not exactly a hotbed of democratic leftist activism, particularly among white folks. And left wingers aren’t noted for being outraged at removal of public school prayer.

He sent his poison letters to Democrats and Republicans alike. I’d say he was politically inscrutable, at least at this point in time.

We’ll get through this, too. But it is going to take an awakening and a reckoning.

Greenflag

@ kevsterino,

As it says in the colourful investment funds brochures in the samll print on page 25 – past performance is no guarantee of future results and this applies to political entities just as much as to corporations or individuals .

I would qualify that by stating that the USA is in terms of resources , population and economic power the best placed of the western democracies to lead the rest of the world to a better future for individual freedom and all that goes with that.

But it seems that the USA is riven apart by growing economic inequality and by the ‘conquest ‘ of the plutocrats of it’s legislative houses (Congress & Senate ) and not merely in relation to the NRA lobby .

The checks and balances developed by the founding fathers don’t work in this 21st century globalised economy – They may still ‘work’ in tying up Congress and the House and the Legislative v the Executive but they haven’t been able to stop the financial sector from becoming even bigger than too big to fail .

No State not even the USA is capable by itself of resolving (in the interests of greater world democracy and stability ) the core issues that lie at the base of the current global currency war /financial chaos / call it what you will.

It will require a multi state approach -another Bretton Woods
if you like, but this time it can’t just include the main western economic powers .

Survival per se is not an issue-It’s survival at what price both economically and politically . Ireland survived the great famine at the cost of 1 million lives and another million emigrants in the mid 19th century .America will survive at the cost of ? the destruction of it’s middle class ? rule by plutocracy ? civil or rather uncivil war ?

Perhaps that sounds too armageddon like but as stated above – past performance is no guarantee of future results .

Kevsterino

@Greenflag, it is hard to tell where and when, but we will reach a turning point when people see how they are being hoodwinked. It isn’t that most thinking people don’t care. More like we are kept so busy trying like hell to succeed we can’t see the treadmill below our feet. Running to stand still while our incomes buy less and less.

But our day will come.

Harry Flashman

Kev the suspect is a 9-11 truther and a picture on his FaceBook page (which I have no idea how to link to) shows him giving the thumbs up and a broad grin to a car sticker bearing the words “Christian and a Democrat”, I’m guessing he ain’t a right-winger but congratulations on proving my point that any nut-job wannabe terrorist in the US must by default be a right-winger.

Greenflag, you need to catch up a bit. The Left abandoned the economic argument decades ago when they realised they could easily co-opt big business to advance their social agenda, likewise big business was very happy to work along with the Left when they realised that increased state control over consumers gave them serious economic advantages in the market place.

The banksters and big government are one and the same now, they have the same agenda, turn individual citizens into wards of the state and captive consumers.

You may have missed it but the Right don’t think very highly of Goldman Sachs (who bankrolled Obama) either.

Kevsterino

Where do I have to go to read what you are, Harry? Foxnews?

Harry Flashman

Kev, are you implying that I am lying? Because I might just get a wee bit pissed off if you are.

Also the general consensus here on right wing white nutjobs appears to be crashing and burning as I write.

I’ll not say “I told you so”.

Yet.

Greenflag

@ Kevsterino ,

‘it is hard to tell where and when, ‘

Nobody foretold the French or Russian revolutions or the rise of Nazism to power in Germany or the more recent collapse of the Soviet Union or the reunification of Germany and nobody can predict when any ‘new ‘ paradigm event will occur to break the current destructive trend both in the USA and in other developed western economies..

I’t isn’t that most thinking people don’t care. ‘

True but it’s actually worse than that . Even for ‘thinking’ people no solution is easily seen much less politically advanced . And thus the continuing emisseration and relative reduction of middle and working class incomes continues apace while the gap between the haves and have nots grows larger .

At some point as you say this unsustainable condition will collapse under the weight of it’s growing contradictions . The gap if you like between Orwellian newspeak and the reality of most people’s lives in the real economy.

People place faith in the ‘internet ‘ and instant worldwide communications to advance democracy and while on the surface that may be the case -it’s too early to judge the final outcome the other side of the ‘technology’ coin is that it has placed enormous informational power on consumers in the hands of corporate and governmental institutions . Like any tool the internet can be used for good purpose but it can also be used to advance the interests of those who would enslave their own peoples ( in the best interests of the people no doubt ).

But what is clear is that political opposition to what I would call ‘banksters ‘rule although that encompasses more than just the financial sector is fragmented -diffuse -uncertain and nowhere united on any practical sustainable alternative to ‘market uber alles’ . Meanwhile remaining safeguards for the lower income groups in all western societies are being whittled away and health and educational standards driven down by ‘reduced ‘ tax revenues -themselves incurred by reduced incomes and loss of tax bases as corporations benefit from nations and regions within states compete against each other to entice ‘business’ to relocate to lower cost areas.

Advancing technologies will soon enough begin to impact on those emerging economies -China , India , Brazil , Indonesia etc who have benefitted most from whats called ‘outsourcing’. These economies will have (are having ) a window of opportunity to catch up with the west . They will soon enough become subject to the same forces that have affected western societies over the past 30 years or so.

Kevsterino

Harry, you needn’t get angry as I’m not saying you’re lying. I just wanted to read about it further to broaden my own understanding.

I’m delighted these two bombers are foreigners, as I said from the beginning. Had they been Americans, it would have put more stress on our political institutions which are already sagging from the weight of so much that divides our nation.

One dead, one to go. I hope the cops can get a clear shot at the white hatted dude and put an end to this.

Greenflag

@ harry flashman,

‘you need to catch up a bit. ‘

LOL

Sorry harry I’m twenty years ahead of you ;

‘The banksters and big government are one and the same now, they have the same agenda, turn individual citizens into wards of the state and captive consumers.’

True up to a point but I would’nt go down the united conspiratorial route which you seem to suggest . I’d call it a ‘marriage ‘of convenience which has turned corporate welfare in the USA and elsewhere into a mini economy all of it’s own . From 72 special interest lobbyists in Washington DC in 1972 to over 5,000 today you can deduce where most of the pressure on politicians is coming from . Over half of USA Senators and Congressmen who retire or run out their terms become (are recruited) as lobbyists by the corporate/financial sectors.

You may have missed it but the Right don’t think very highly of Goldman Sachs

Rand Paul and the libertarians perhaps .

The establishment right benefitted most from Goldman Sachs and the other banks in the recent presidential election .

Somebody made a comment that the difference between the Republicans and the Democrats in the USA is that the Republicans give the banksters 110% of what they (the banksters want ) whereas the Democrats only give them 99% 🙁

Greenflag

The Boston bombers have been identified as Chechnyans presumably Islamic from the Caucus region of Russia -news just in .

Greenflag

‘Kev the suspect is a 9-11 truther ‘

Main thing is they have been caught .Good work by the Boston police and people .

Kevsterino

Greenflag, I think Harry was saying the risin guy is a 9-11 truther. To be candid, I’m not exactly sure what that means, as it is a bit of a contrived term. At any rate, I can’t call him left or right as it appears he sought notoriety by attacking Democrats and Republicans alike. But to Harry, of course, he must be a leftist.

I’m very glad these bombers came from beyond our shores, although having lived here so long, it makes me wonder. It is strange to see an American city on lock down. I don’t think it has ever happened before, even during the civil war.

PeterBrown

“One dead, one to go. I hope the cops can get a clear shot at the white hatted dude and put an end to this.”

Kevsterino – shoot to kill? Surely some mistake?

Kevsterino

Peter, in the current circumstances, eg his brother had a bomb strapped to him when he was dispatched, he presents a clear and present danger not only to arresting officers, but the public at large.

Yep, put one in his ear from a hundred yards if you have to.

observational

Does no-one think its a bit far fetched that these guys, who supposedly placed the bombs at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, robbed a convenience store? Three days after the bombing?

Really?

Kevsterino

The whole thing is bizarre.

Dread Cthulhu

It turns out that the bombers were a pair of Chechen Muslims.

So much for the hopes that this was something other than that.

Harry Flashman

Goodness me, how things change around here so swiftly.

As I surmised from the start, the media bandwagon of “it must be right wing nutjobs” is, again, wrong.

The demographic responsible for the LA Airport shooting, DC snipers, Times Square bombing and French shootings last year appear to be the same as the Boston Marathon bombers, and once again it isn’t right wing nutjobs.

Greenie, it might shock you to discover that the NRA hasn’t got a chapter in Grozny and Kev the Tea Party have as yet not built up a following in Chechnya.

Am I allowed to say “I told you so” yet? Is anyone here going to have the decency to say “you know what Harry, I hate you and everything you stand for, but you called it right on this occasion”? Anyone? No?

Is that the crickets chirping again?

By the way Kev don’t be so obtuse, you know damn well what a 9-11 truther is.

Greenflag

Harry Flash ‘ it might shock you to discover that the NRA hasn’t got a chapter in Grozny’

They don’t need one .They kill indirectly more than enough people in the USA as it is and have the money to defy (buy the votes of politicians ) against the wishes of over 90% of the American people by ensuring that background checks are not carried out on all would be arms purchasers.

The media bandwagon as always shoots first and aims later .They have to . Its what brings in the revenue . Heres a nice cartoon to explain how it worked in this bizarre case

No kev you did not say along you hoped it was foreigners, from the start you assumed it was right wing nutters. Only when I raised the idea that it was jihadis did you start mentioning obliquely the term foreigners. Come on guys it won’t kill ya just admit ol’ Harry called it right.

If you seriously don’t understand the term 9-11 truther you really shouldn’t be posting on a political weblog.

Kevsterino

Oh Harry, here is my first post regarding who might have done it: “@Greenflag, April does seem to bring out the worst in the lunatic fringe. Personally, I suspect a ‘lone wolf’ (apologies to a noble animal for being lumped in with scumbags) is at work here. This reminds me of when the Atlanta Olympics got bombed. Politically, Boston’s hue is of the deepest blue. Gay people get married there!?!? No shortage of crazies with a grudge against Beantown.”

Greenflag responded with the possibility of neo-nazis etc.

Believe what you like regarding my opinions. It really doesn’t make any difference. Your vague references to other demographic groups who would hate Boston are noted as not being incorrect.

Greenflag

harry flash ,

‘If you seriously don’t understand the term 9-11 truther you really shouldn’t be posting on a political weblog.’

I don’t understand and have little interest in astrology , homeopathy , scientology or tarot cards although I have hear of these pseudo sciences /religions . Why would the 9/11 truthers be any different ? Wired to the moon loonies Harry .
As for these Chechens all we know at this stage is that they appear to have led relatively normal lives in the sense that any refugee can -up to now -so the authorities are having a difficult time coming up with any discernible motive -political -religious or otherwise .

Maybe it was just that April thing yet again .

Kevsterino

The word ‘truther’ I treat like another recent piece of loony jargon, ‘birther’. If nuts refuse to use words ordinarily and generally understood it would make it easier to follow along.

It is just a bit of petty nonsense not worth the bother.

I think Harry is just upset by people using the term right-wing and nutter in the same vein.

Reader

kevsterino: The word ‘truther’ I treat like another recent piece of loony jargon, ‘birther’. If nuts refuse to use words ordinarily and generally understood it would make it easier to follow along.
I thought ‘truther’ and ‘birther’ were terms used to describe nuts, rather than used by the nuts themselves. However, given that the two positions are based at separate positions on the political spectrum, I expect they might use the terms on each other.
Anyway, it’s reasonable to have a shorthand to allow us to communicate what we are dealing with: truther; birther; fundie; gun nut; creationist. Is there a term for the moon landing hoax crowd?

Kevsterino

@Reader, I would call them lunatics, but I think that would be too lunar to be really creative.

I try to avoid jargon when on a transcontinental message board. If I didn’t, I could serve up my twisted Missourian idiom and nobody would understand me at all.

Oh wait, I might be doing that already…

Rory Carr

The mother of the two Tsarnaev brothers was interviewed onRussia Today and is adamant that the older son, Tamerlane, believed killed in a confrontation with Boston police, has in fact been a long-term FBI asset.

The younger son however is reported as having been taken alive after being found hiding on a boat in the Watertown area around 01.00am GMT. I am relieved to hear this as I was finding a deep well of compassionate concern for this young man’s well-being arising as this saga continued. At least now there is hope.

The plot thickens.

Kevsterino

Suspect is being treated in the hospital for wounds that are nearly a day old. It will probably be a while before he goes to trial. In the meantime I hope he sings like a canary.

Rory Carr

Reading reports in the New York Times indicate that, during the first fire-fight with the Boston police, the older brother, Tamerlane, threw an explosive device towards the police lines then as it exploded, rushed the lines firing and so allowed his younger brother to escape by driving his vehicle straight through the disrupted police line.

There is a terrible sadness to all this, something decent and heroic about the brothers and something absolutely, awfully terrible in the consequences of their actions – one family with an eight-year-old dead, his mother brain-damaged and his sister with a limb torn away. Knee-jerk condemnatopn is not enough, we must hope that the US learns something from this and know that compassion is ot limited – it does not deplete, but rather increases the more we exercise it, for victims and perpetrators alike.

Back to reading Zorba the Greek</i to find some solace in all this madness.

Kevsterino

@Rory, I would also note that he apparently made his escape by driving over his brother. It is not clear at this point whether he was alive at that point in time.

Compassion, I agree, is a sublime emotion difficult to maintain while someone is doing his best to kill you. Not impossible, but damn difficult. It will be months before this young man is brought to the bar to answer for his crimes. Every person I’ve read who knew this kid has something nice to say about him. We live in a strange world.

babyface finlayson

Rory Carr
“something decent and heroic about the brothers”
I don’t think that is a good choice of words.
Tragic certainly. And for us far removed from events we can argue for compassion.
I struggle to see anything decent or heroic in their actions.

Kevsterino

There was something decent and heroic going on all around the brothers, but not by the brothers. The height of decency and heroism lies with those who rendered immediate aid to victims while unsure the bombing had stopped. Some of them had already run 26.2 miles before rushing to aid people they didn’t know from Adam.

That is heroic and decent.

The brothers?

Greenflag

@ kevsterino ,

‘I could serve up my twisted Missourian idiom and nobody would understand me at all.’

The Sooner you start talkin like everybody else’s jargon the more you’ll be misunderstood . For those interested in the idioms of this island from Ulster Scots to Forth and Bargy to Kerry and Dublin 4 here’s a link from the University Of Duisburg & Essen website which might help the non Irish and even the Irish to hear themselves talkin in their various accents /idioms ..

A cheerful story but the real midland humour is in the last 25 seconds as to how he’ll deal with the ‘letters’ .

Missourian can’t be that difficult no?

Kevsterino

If you’ve read any Mark Twain, you would probably have no difficulty, Greenflag.

Greenflag

I was reared on Mark Twain 😉 . Came across His ‘Letters from the Earth ‘ about 10 years ago or so. . Should be required reading for all NI folks and indeed all folks everywhere .

Here’s Twain on ‘man ‘the most rational of creatures’

“Man is the Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he is the Unreasoning Animal… In truth, man is incurably foolish. Simple things which other animals easily learn, he is incapable of learning. Among my experiments was this. In an hour I taught a cat and a dog to be friends. I put them in a cage. In another hour I taught them to be friends with a rabbit. In the course of two days I was able to add a fox, a goose, a squirrel and some doves. Finally a monkey. They lived together in peace; even affectionately.

(I might question Twain’s scientific method in the above but his second ‘experiment ‘ is alas the human condition in extremis .)

‘Next, in another cage I confined an Irish Catholic from Tipperary, and as soon as he seemed tame I added a Scotch Presbyterian from Aberdeen. Next a Turk from Constantinople; a Greek Christian from Crete; an Armenian; a Methodist from the wilds of Arkansas; a Buddhist from China; a Brahman from Benares. Finally, a Salvation Army Colonel from Wapping. Then I stayed away for two whole days. When I came back to note results, the cage of Higher Animals was all right, but in the other there was but a chaos of gory odds and ends of turbans and fezzes and plaids and bones and flesh–not a specimen left alive. These Reasoning Animals had disagreed on a theological detail and carried the matter to a Higher Court.”

― Mark Twain, Letters from the Earth: Uncensored Writings

PS – Have you ever been to Sikeston or St Joseph both in Missouri ? I was on a project there about 12 years ago ,I could understand them perfectly well but what I did’nt understand was Lambert’s Cafe in Sikeston where as soon as you enter they start throwing bread rolls at you. Only later did I find out it was the home of one Rush Limbaugh. Had he been there in Lambert’s I’d have thrown a potato at him 😉

A sample of the local patois for irish/british ears

Comrade Stalin

Not sure at all about the “heroic and decent” thing at all there. These guys targeted civilians, little children. I guess if I made a stretch you might be talking about the way they chose to fight their way out instead of committing suicide but I still can’t quite bring myself to find anything positive about it. Their fate was sealed as soon as they chose to plant those bombs, there was no way they were going to be on the run for long.

I imagine in the case of the now-captured young guy he will tell the full story, and the story will be one of a dominant and ideologically crazed older brother leading on a naive and impressionable young man.

Rory Carr

In using “heroic and decent” I was not of course referring to the bloody actions of the Tsarnaev brothers in planting those bombs that created such horror and I thought I had made that clear. Such action was inexcusable. But neither can an appalling act eradicate all other aspects of the perpetrators’ character and from what we have learned of that from their family, friends and acquaintances to date these young men were essentially decent and, however desperate, however bloody the consequences and terrible the damage to the police, there was an element of heroism in the older brother’s sacrifice to aid his younger sibling’s escape.

God knows what terrible grievance, real or imagined, drove these young men to commit such atrocity but, if we are to learn anything from these past few days, we would be well to make an attempt to find out. President Obama at least seems to agree that this ought to be the priority.

Kevsterino

Greenflag, been to Sikeston many times and have thrown and caught many rolls. Delicious, but you have to be alert! I still have family in St. Joe but haven’t been there in many years, it being on the other side of the world and all. ;o)

Kevsterino

btw, Greenflag, Limbaugh hales from Cape Girardeau. His daddy was a judge in St. Louis.

wee buns

RCGod knows what terrible grievance, real or imagined, drove these young men to commit such atrocity

These guys are suspects only, and while BO’s statement is focused on finding a motive, the most important step that the US can take to decrease terrorism is to stop engaging in it.

Kevsterino

wee buns, yeah, the US really messed up those boys’ lives. Shameful. And Chechnya, we really screwed the pooch on that one too. Get real, Obama doesn’t care as much about their motive as he does about what this boy is going to tell him about how this came down and who helped them.

wee buns

As yet they are innocent. Get real.

Kevsterino

Tamerlane is dead. He will not be getting a day in court, so I have to go by what I’ve seen and heard and read. Judging by the circumstances in which he died, I feel comfortable calling him guilty.

As for the younger one, he’ll get his day in court. Until then, before the law, he is innocent in the eyes of the law.

A namesake of mine, but not a known relative, emigrated to the USA from near Mosside in north Antrim just over a century ago. His granddaughter and her husband were injured in the bomb attack; the granddaughter had to have part of a leg amputated and her husband had shrapnel injuries to his legs. This young woman’s mother and a cousin are both on my Facebook friends list. A local NALIL friend of mine was in the US on holiday in the Appalachians a few years ago where he bumped into the cousin and subsequently put her in touch with me and later on with the injured woman’s mum. The internet has made the world a very small place.

Rory I’m sure you’ve heard the old expression that when in a hole it is best to stop digging. Violent

Violent criminals dying in shootouts with the police are not exactly uncommon events. Only someone with an extremely warped sense of idealism -or political axe to grind- could possibly refer to a pair of child killers (Slugger O’Toole is safely without the jurisdiction of the US courts and thus no punctilious presumption of innocence is required here, we are not law enforcement officers or US journalists) who are caught in the act of robbing a convenience store and then murder a police officer responding to the incident and attempt to kill many others, as “heroic”.

There was fuck all heroic about these thugs. The mass murderers at school shootings frequently die at the scene of the crime, would you refer to them as “heroic”?

As has been pointed out the Chechen problem is diddly squat to do with the US, you can’t blame Bush for that one, that is 100% Russia’s doing. The US gave these two men, and their families, refuge and by all accounts a standard of living and education they could never have dreamed of back in the shitehole from which they crawled out. Whatever issue these men had it certainly wasn’t with the United States of America.

Rory Carr

“Whatever issue these men had it certainly wasn’t with the United States of America.

There is stark evidence to the contrary, Harry. It is geographical by nature – the bombs planted at the finish of the marathon in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

Wee Buns has already above suggested what grievance against the US might have been the motivation . Now you might well be happy with the policy of the US’s privatised war against all and sundry but, you must at least admit that, much as the friends and relatives of the victims of the Boston bombings are enraged by that action and thirsting for vengance, so there are those enraged at the countless acts of US terrorism and the mayhem, horror and misery they create.

It’s not as though the Tsarnaev brothers were the first men of Islamic roots resident in the USA to become alienated. Among those so enraged in recent years have been, Faisal Shahzad, who staged the failed Times Square bombing, and six months earlier, in November 2009, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, then 39, was accused of opening fire on a crowd of soldiers and civilians at Fort Hood, Tex., killing 13 people; and then there was Najibullah Zazi, the Afghan-American who plotted to attack the New York subway with backpacks loaded with explosives, [who] spent five years as a popular coffee vendor in Manhattan’s financial district, with a “God Bless America” sign on his cart. He was 24 at the time of his arrest. (source- New York Times).

In his statement to the court Faizal Shahzad cited the civilian casualties of indiscriminate drone attacks, The drones, he said, “kill women, children, they kill everybody.”

“It’s a war, and in war, they kill people,” he added. “They’re killing all Muslims.”

‘Akbar Ahmed, the chairman of Islamic studies at American University in Washington, described such men: “They are American, but not quite American.” His new book, “The Thistle and the Drone: How America’s War on Terrorism Became a War on Tribal Islam,” examines how tribal codes of hospitality, courage and revenge have shaped the reaction to American counterterrorism strikes. ‘ (Scott Shane,New York Times, 20 April 2013)

The FBI it seems, when warned by Russian intelligence that Tamerlane Tsarnaev might pose a threat, poo-pooed the notion because, as you inform us, “the Chechen problem is diddly squat to do with the US“.

Well it has now – “No man is an island…” and all that.

Harry Flashman

So Muslims around the world have carte blanche to kill men, women and children wherever they want and they can simply blame it all on US foreign policy, have I got that right?

A Pakistani can kill Indians in Calcutta, a Chechen can slaughter schoolkids in Russia, Indonesians can blow up surfers and Hindus in Bali, Yorkshiremen can blow apart commuters in London, Tunisians can do the same in Madrid, Thais can behead schoolteachers, Egyptians can lynch Copts, Frenchmen can blow little Jewish girls’ brains out, Dutchmen can eviscerate movie directors and Danes can try to murder cartoonists.

No problem in Rory’s eyes, just as long as they use the “I’m a Muslim and Bush made me do it” card?

Tell me, would Poles have been permitted to kill Canadians in Italy in protest at British policy toward Northern Irish Catholics in this weird moral universe you inhabit, where child killers are simply misunderstood heroes?

Rory Carr

Do be careful, Harry, you have piled up so many straw men in your last ridiculous rejoinder that there is danger of us all catching fire.

There ought to be a public policy against all this Vicky Pollard type of argument (“So, you think my bum looks too big in these shorts, so, you hate all people with big bums. You hate all Americans. You hate Oprah Winfrey. You want to kill Oprah Winfrey. You’re a murderer so you are.”)

“So Muslims around the world have carte blanche to kill men, women and children wherever they want and they can simply blame it all on US foreign policy, have I got that right?”

Well I don’t know, Harry. You’re the one who said it, so answer your own question and, please, avoid passing that statement off as mine with all the finesse of a Texas Republican huxter.

Try turning that argument back on yourself whereby we live in a world where US imperialism not alone, seeks, but clearly has and exercises “carte blanche to kill men, women and children wherever they want” . The difference is, of course, that the US kill men, women and children on an industrial scale on an almost daily basis. That the comparatively tiny pin-pricks of reaction against such massive slaughter receive such universal publicity while the U.S. slaughter of innocents, on a mass scale, goes largely unreported speaks only to the power of U.S. hegemony and the lapdog-like subservience and fear it instils in those who might better question its ruthlessness.

Kevsterino

Rory, “The difference is, of course, that the US kill men, women and children on an industrial scale on an almost daily basis. ”

Surely you can make your argument without stooping to such gross exaggeration.

Rory Carr

Quite so, Kevestrino. I am properly chastened.

“The difference is, of course, that the U.S. kills men, women and children on a small industrial scale on an almost daily basis. ”

Will that do ?

Kevsterino

Still gross, but what the hell, it’s your post and you can tell it like you see it. Both terms, ‘small industrial scale’ and ‘almost daily basis’ are not exactly meaningful but if you think they strengthen your point, feel free to sound off with as much bluster as you wish.

Harry Flashman

I notice Rory you have quietly sidled away from your “heroic” description of these men, very wise.

I recall a day when the Left despised religious fundamentalism and fanatics. Funny how when the US is the main enemy of such God-bothering lunatics the Left gets so teary eyed over them.

It’s a strange world, as the late Mrs T once said.

boondock

I think young muslims who are being radicalised in Europe and North America whilst enjoying their western materialistic lives need to know that most muslim casualties of war throughout the world are inflicted by er other muslims but hey lets blame the yanks for everything its amazing how these extremists have conveniently forgotten about the strikes against Belgrade and the thousands of Serbs killed by Nato and the US to help Kosovo.

I also see the conspiracy theories are going into overdrive. Just google or youtube boston false flag. These nuts just like 9-11 look at the smallest details and present it as ‘proof” without looking at the bigger picture – do they reallly believe such an inept goverment could keep pulling off these unbelievably elaborate hoaxes which would involve thousands of people and not one of them going to the press, really? did these idiots not see what happened in New Orleans a few years ago! – they couldnt organize a piss up in a brewery when needed

Rory Carr

Rather than “sidle away”, Harry, if you had taken care to read my post properly you would have seen that I quoted the chairman of Islamic studies at American University in Washington to reinforce my argument. He “examines how tribal codes of hospitality, courage and revenge have shaped the reaction to American counterterrorism strikes. “[my emphasis].

In maturity I am cultivating a doctrine of “live and let live” and even in youth had always argued for the rights of nations and peoples to develop at their own pace free from the “aid” of imperialist pretend “do-gooders”. Regime change was considered an international crime until Blair and Bush decided to slaughter untold Iraquis, destroy their country’s infrastructure, collude in the gruesome public murder of the president and foment sectarian civil war on an unprecedented scale – and all so that Bush’s business partners could make untold fortunes from the privatisation of that obscenity.

In seeking to give legitimacy to the war-crimes of these most vile beings, Harry, you are dancing with the devil. It is quite shameful of you. The fanatical religious fundamentalism you cite is a direct consequence of U.S. policy, and you must know that. The country from whence it springs in all its zealotry is a U.S. ally, armed to the teeth by U.S.ordnance reinforced by military training and practically free from criticism in the world’s “free press” such is the dictatorial reality of U.S. hegemony. The U.S. has turned the world into a cockpit that a few of its most obscenely wealthy citizens might profit from the replenishment of cockspurs while you, Harry, stand on the sides cheering them on. Live with yourself !

Harry Flashman

Calm down dear.

Reader

Rory Carr: In maturity I am cultivating a doctrine of “live and let live” and even in youth had always argued for the rights of nations and peoples to develop at their own pace free from the “aid” of imperialist pretend “do-gooders”.
Then what’s your position on ‘sanctions’?

Rory Carr

“… what’s your position on ‘sanctions’?”

Bit of a moveable feast really. Sanctions are applied as an economic weapon and as such are intended to damage the development of the nation against which they are directed. That they are a tool of imperialism is easy to see in the case of Cuba or, more recently, Iraq but less easy in the case of apartheid South Africa. In the latter case sanctions were reluctantly applied because of the massive profits that would be lost, in particular in the arms and security industry and also because of a fraternal sense of crude racism among many exporters. But eventually the demands of international profit won out – there was more to be exploited in a reasonably stable post-apartheid South Africa than in an unstable country constantly at war with itself and ever with the danger that a truly socialist ANC might gain power through attrition. So it was that sanctions were used rather more as a propaganda weapon to kosher up western capitalists as somehow “the good guys” while the important business of softening up Mandela to act as capitalism’s stooge and weakening the ANC from within went on apace (Thabo Mbeki anyone ?).

So I take each case as I see it but rarely have I ever, if at all, witnessed a true application of sanctions for good, moral purpose. Business just does not work that way, while, like the law it insists on its basic amorality, it tends more often than not, where its interests are threatened or where greater profit beckons to quite easily slip into immorality of the most vile category.

Greenflag

@Rory

‘Business ——–tends more often than not, where its interests are threatened or where greater profit beckons to quite easily slip into immorality of the most vile category.’

And the same can be said of the RC Church , Imperialism , Governments without Opposition, and even with Opposition , Fanatical ideologues of right and left and religious fundamentalists of east and west .

@ harry flash ,

There are I believe a billion Muslims on the planet and almost 3 million in the USA and millions more in western countries . Only a tiny percentage are fanatics -the vast majority like the vast majority of Prods and Taigs in NI are good people and citizens of their respective states . I might disagree with all of them over the tenets of their particular religion but we must not to coin an old phrase tar all with the same brush for simply being muslim -ditto for protestant , catholic , jew , russian , american or briton .